Zineb Ait has confirmed this update is not related to Penguin. “It is simply one of frequent quality updates.”, she said on Twitter. John Mueller blessed her tweet with a “like”.

Yesterday we reported a significant volatility level in Google’s results but it looks like that was only a warm-up. Today is like nothing we’ve seen in 2015. It’s bigger than Penguin 3. The only event with the greater impact on search results was PayDay Loan update back in May 2014.

What do we know about this update?

Global

It looks like Penguin, but it’s broader in its scope so at this stage it appears to be a multi-purpose update encompassing a range of search quality parameters. From webmaster reports we know this update carries global impact.

Link Spam

Some shocking websites have suddenly appeared in Google’s results (anchor text manipulation, link networks) so it appears as if the update hasn’t rolled out completely. If it has… well then it’s a likely failure and it will have to be rolled back much like they did in December 2014.

Localisation

There are still hints of this being localisation related change as well (some websites are now showing double listings classic organic and local organic).

Snippets

Certain results now show longer, very detailed snippets which often disregard meta description. These appear to a limited audience, likely a test.

Dan Petrovic, the managing director of DEJAN, is Australia’s best-known name in the field of search engine optimisation. Dan is a web author, innovator and a highly regarded search industry event speaker.